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Public area => The Pub => Features => Topic started by: Nao on August 5th, 2011, 12:26 PM

Title: Calendar dates
Post by: Nao on August 5th, 2011, 12:26 PM
As I mentioned in another post (in the team boards), I think it'd be nice to be able to translate holidays into other languages.

Most of these holidays are English-centric though -- e.g. St Patrick's Day? I think 95% of the planet doesn't have a clue what it's about... I think it's Irish or something. It's all I know. I would tend to either delete this one (and maybe a few others like Halloween), or add more. Why does the database have the national days for the US and Mexico, but not other countries? It always seemed to me like it was an unfinished feature...
We could these dates out of the default package, and offer add-ons that will simply insert dates in the database. We could then have a US date database, a French one, a Zimbabwean one, etc...

Or maybe we could add a field to the dates, specifying which country/culture should be able to see a date.

Opinions welcome on these matters!
Title: Re: Calendar dates
Post by: Arantor on August 5th, 2011, 12:43 PM
It is an Irish thing (St Patrick being the patron saint of Ireland) but the British and Americans seem to celebrate it.

What would be good is providing a package of some description that supplies all the relevant cultural dates, but making them translated doesn't seem to be a big deal to me, more importantly to get the dates provided for different groups.
Title: Re: Calendar dates
Post by: billy2 on August 5th, 2011, 01:42 PM
Quote from Arantor on August 5th, 2011, 12:43 PM
It is an Irish thing (St Patrick being the patron saint of Ireland) but the British and Americans seem to celebrate it.
Over 36million Americans claimed Irish ancestry in 2008 - because the Americans need to cling to something ;)
Northern and Southern Irelands population is around 6.2million (2008) and like a good knees up - with or without an excuse.
Brits celebrate it purely as a reason to get totally blathered on the 'black stuff'. Well I do anyway ;)

[edited to say - Guinness in the UK is not a patch on the Guinness available in Ireland]
Title: Re: Calendar dates
Post by: Arantor on August 5th, 2011, 01:45 PM
Yes, we do use it as an excuse to get very drunk, don't we?[1] I don't personally, don't really drink, and normally my other half is working and isn't able to go for a drink at lunchtime - and isn't really in the mood for a lot of drinking after work.

One of these days though, we're going to have to hop on a ferry to Eire and have a drink with the natives, so to speak; though I doubt I'll be supping a pint of the black stuff, nor play on that blasted harp ;) I don't really like Guinness...
 1. I'm British in case it wasn't clear.
Title: Re: Calendar dates
Post by: billy2 on August 5th, 2011, 01:56 PM
15 mins from Brighton and a similar distance  from London (IIRC) definitely puts you in the UK ;)

You could be mildly surprised by a native Guinness once there.

My wife doesnt drink much either............ I had to shovel her into a taxi from a friends 50th - at 22.30!! But thats another story.

Title: Re: Calendar dates
Post by: Arantor on August 5th, 2011, 01:58 PM
Well, I'm 45 minutes from our great metropolis, and I'm not sure whether that's a good or bad thing. Certainly, it used to suck when commuting there to be in work by 8am...

I might be surprised; I'll give it an honest go when I make it over there sometime... ;)
Title: Re: Calendar dates
Post by: Nao on August 6th, 2011, 12:08 PM
Quote from Arantor on August 5th, 2011, 12:43 PM
What would be good is providing a package of some description that supplies all the relevant cultural dates, but making them translated doesn't seem to be a big deal to me, more importantly to get the dates provided for different groups.
Okay, you'll have to develop because I can't make any sense out of that sentence ;)
Title: Re: Calendar dates
Post by: Johnny54 on August 6th, 2011, 12:32 PM
I know there is many software (calendars / schedulers / PIM's) that use http://icalshare.com/
Maybe it is usefull for Wedge too.
Title: Re: Calendar dates
Post by: Arantor on August 6th, 2011, 01:28 PM
Nao, all I was getting at is that I'm not bothered by trying to localise the names of the holidays themselves - Christmas is the same in most languages, and stuff like Cinco de Mayo, is written and referred to as in Spanish, even in non Spanish speaking communities.

Producing packages of different dates would be good though.
Title: Re: Calendar dates
Post by: pgordemer on August 6th, 2011, 10:30 PM
Quote from billy2 on August 5th, 2011, 01:56 PM
15 mins from Brighton and a similar distance  from London (IIRC) definitely puts you in the UK ;)
I was born in Southgate (N14) but raised in Hove (BN32WR) until 8 years old, then moved to the US. After all these years I will have my British Passport.
Title: Re: Calendar dates
Post by: DoctorMalboro on August 7th, 2011, 04:40 AM
Never forget October 20th. The official "Day of Awesomeness!" worldwide :P
Title: Re: Calendar dates
Post by: Dismal Shadow on August 7th, 2011, 06:18 AM
Or the 5th of November, no reason why it should EVER been forget. :P
Title: Re: Calendar dates
Post by: live627 on August 7th, 2011, 07:18 AM
or July 4th for Americans. Independence from what, again? Or is it dependence on Uncle Sam? :P
Title: Re: Calendar dates
Post by: Nao on August 7th, 2011, 07:29 AM
@John> To most people outside the US, 'Independence Day' is an action movie ;)
Quote from Arantor on August 6th, 2011, 01:28 PM
Nao, all I was getting at is that I'm not bothered by trying to localise the names of the holidays themselves - Christmas is the same in most languages,
Uhh... Well, in French it's Noël and all our hearts warm at the mention of the name 'Noël', but not when we hear about 'Christmas'. Most of us know what Christmas is, but it doesn't strike a chord like Noël. In Japanese it's only called 'Kurisumasu' (direct phonetic transcription) because to them it's a bit like Halloween: an imported, recent non-religious fun day. In Spanish it's Navidad, in German it's Christtag, actually if you go look at Wikipedia and all the links to other languages, Christmas is *only* used in English... :^^;:

So, to me, it should be {cal_christmas} or something like that... ;)
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and stuff like Cinco de Mayo, is written and referred to as in Spanish, even in non Spanish speaking communities.
I never heard of Cinco de Mayo before, though... I think translating cal_mexday to 'Fête Nationale du Mexique' would make more sense to me. Much more sense. Or maybe have cal_mexday_title to do that. And we add hover titles if available.
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Producing packages of different dates would be good though.
Yep. Although if we translate entries, it may not be as useful... So, what's best?
Title: Re: Calendar dates
Post by: Arantor on August 7th, 2011, 12:30 PM
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@John> To most people outside the US, 'Independence Day' is an action movie
Here it's sort of both a holiday we're aware of as much as it is a film, but then again I suppose as we're the nation from whom independence was declared...
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So, to me, it should be {cal_christmas} or something like that...
That argument can readily be made of any of the holidays. Thinking about it, then, every single one of the entries could need to be translated... hmm, new approach needed methinks.
Title: Re: Calendar dates
Post by: Nao on August 7th, 2011, 12:57 PM
Quote from Arantor on August 7th, 2011, 12:30 PM
Here it's sort of both a holiday we're aware of as much as it is a film, but then again I suppose as we're the nation from whom independence was declared...
Those yankee bastards!!! :lol:
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That argument can readily be made of any of the holidays.
My point exactly.
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Thinking about it, then, every single one of the entries could need to be translated... hmm, new approach needed methinks.
Why? We can simply store {cal_*} into the database at install time, and then for user-entered names, there's always the (possibly upcoming) 'lang' tag... (Although it means we'd have to parse_bbc_inline the name, ah ah.)
Title: Re: Calendar dates
Post by: Arantor on August 7th, 2011, 01:02 PM
If you're using something like the lang tag, you don't need to translate it, you just store the version with all the languages in the installer. Though that is a problem too, I think the length of the holiday name is rather short.